On Monday Nov. 6, I received an email that claimed to have been sent by Comcast. The email sender indicated was “alerts@comcast.net” <cmontanero@comcast.net> whom I’ve never heard of and there was a strange subject line: “NOTIFICATION ID : VRDHJHPBEZ“. The email message claimed that my last Comcast payment did not go through and that I should click on a link in the email to correct the problem.
This had all the look of a phishing email to me, although at first the message seemed convincing. So I went directly to my Comcast account on the web where I discovered that I had no problem with my account, which confirmed my suspicion that it was a phishing attack.
With a quick Google search I found that Comcast customers have reported an email phishing scam that bears a strong similarity to the phishing message I received.
So if you are a Comcast customer and receive an email like this, do not click on the link in the email. Instead, if you are ever concerned about the authenticity of an email purportedly sent by a reputable company with which you have an account, go directly to your account website to see what the issue is. Read my blog on Dealing with Phishy Email to get additional advice on how to avoid being snared in phishing nets.
Be informed, be vigilent and stay safe on the Internet.
I work for Trend Micro and the opinions expressed here are my own.
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